auton

A machine or robot, usually in the form of a living being, designed to follow a precise sequence of instructions.

Not far away in the woods the Auton had been standing motionless under a tree. It was shaped like a man but it was not human.

Juan made seven attempts to pervert the auton. One involved twelve hundred years of careful observation, timing the failure of various subsystems, maneuvering the auton into a position where he might take control and get transportation to resources in near space.

A surname.